The List
by capitol grasshopper
Summary: Prompt: Try not to think about Phil, after the shock of May's "I love you," tracking her down so they can really talk. Just in case you missed it on tumblr P


_AN: See, I've been thinking about this the whole week and somehow I don't think **he** would. Not right away. Not while she's still angry and hurt and they both have a chance to think it through._

* * *

She might expect him to find her at some point later that night, but _he_ doesn't.

Phil Coulson doesn't know how to face the truth that the woman he loves actually loves him just as much.

So he's checking on Deke, helping Daisy making plans for their next move, sharing a beer with newly appointed surgeon Mackenzie and doctor Piper. Then he's off to bed.

It's only at some ungodly hour in the morning that Melinda May slips out of her room in sweatpants and loose shirt, forsaking any pretense of sleep, and finds the strip of light still on under his door.

He looks up at her from a yellowing paper with red rimmed eyes when she gently pushes the door open. He probably tried to sleep as well if his clothes are to be believed, but given the state of his hair it can't have lasted long. He's sitting on the edge of his bunk, sheets stripped down to the bottom in haste.

"I owe you an apology," he says, quieter than ever. And she wants to remind him he doesn't _owe_ her anything. She's fully responsible for the depth of her feelings for him. But she stays still on the threshold, not quite out, not completely in, and waits for him to continue, because he probably needs to say it more than she needs to hear it.

"I made it all about myself, I guess." Which he had all the right to do. "Acted like I was the only one affected..." She watches, unmoving, as he drops his gaze to the crumpling piece of paper in his hands again. "It seemed like a good idea at the time, to die in the field, back when you didn't know. I didn't mean to be reckless I just thought... It would have been easier on everybody… if you hadn't known."

The pause stretches a beat longer and she knows he's waiting for her to fill the silence if she has anything to add but she stays still, eyes dark, gritting her teeth.

He sighs. "I made a deal with the devil and asked you all to accept the consequences without question which is… terrible leadership if nothing else. It seemed..." Then he pauses mid sentence to huff a timid laugh that lits his face like it used to for a second: " _It seemed the right thing to do at the time_. That should be on my tombstone!"

She can't find it in herself to joke about it like he wants to, she just shifts on her feet uncomfortably and crosses her arms, breathing around the lump in her throat.

"Not funny, I get it." He grimaces to the piece of paper in his hands. "I'm failing rather spectacularly at this."

"I always thought I'd go first," she finally says, and she cannot recognize her own voice. "Being a specialist, I always thought I'd go first." That was before Bahrein. After, she was already gone. "I understand. It was comforting," she explains "to know I'd never live a day without you."

"May-"

"We've always been on the same page, you and I, but now you keep me two steps behind and if I can't follow, Phil, I... I-" The next words won't come out. I can't do it again. Because she can, she knows she can live without him, she did it before, twice, those agonizing weeks after New York and the lifetime in the framework she still feels crawling under her skin. She was alive and it was hell. "I won't give up." As selfish as it sounds to her own ears, she's not enlisting his help. This is _her_ choice.

He stares back, looking so much older than she can remember. "I can't change this now," he says, defeated. "Will you ever forgive me?"

She feels like crumpling to the floor, but it's only her tears dropping soundlessly when she nods.

Even the neon lights seem to flicker then, casting different shadows on the grey sheets, the metal walls, his pale skin. But his eyes are clear and bright as always. She still trusts him with her life.

"Would you help me with number eight?" Phil asks holding up the paper between two fingers.

Melinda closes the door, quietly drying her eyes when he can't see her, before sitting thigh to thigh on the unmade bed and unfolding the paper. It's just a simple sheet teared off of a SHIELD notepad like they used since the academy, she can still make out the logo in the middle between the creases and the yellowing color.

 _Complete Cap's card collection_ , she reads underneath the strike that crosses off the first line. Her breath catches. "When did you write this?"

It's his neat handwriting, black ink reddening on the edges with age.

"Ninety Five? After Glasgow. I found it in an old pile of scrap paper three years ago and kept it on the Zephir when I was no longer director. It was still there... earlier."

No wonder he decided to sacrifice himself so readily, she thinks with consternation. It's a short list, mostly crossed off already, sometimes with a different ink. _Stupid, stupid man_. Anger catches in her throat again and this time it tastes like iron. No agent should have a list of that kind. What happens when you check it all...

"You never got your Cap's cards signed," she comments flatly remembering his last voicemail on her machine before he had to leave for the helicarrier.

"I can't really complain, I still got to meet him in person."

He shifts on the bed, propping his back against the wall and she follows, like missing his warmth is a betrayal she wasn't expecting. And maybe he did not do it on purpose, he looks surprised when she sighs and curls her legs on his outstretched ones. At least something has changed since they filed mission reports late at night in his office.

He drove Lola across the country on the Route 66. With Audrey, the summer they decided to settle down.

"You never got married," she points out at the unchecked wish.

He shrugs lightly, smiling, but it's not sad. "That's the reason I was able to cross off the last one," he says.

 _Help someone else get the chance you missed_ , reads the last entry. "Fitzsimmons," she whispers. What he wouldn't do for the little mismatched family they built. She has to purse her lips and he has to brush her shoulder, and when she's breathing through her nose to keep her fears inside, even when his arm sneaks around her and she leans on his chest, breathing him in makes her eyes fill again.

"Phil? You never had a child, have you..."

The three words are cancelled nonetheless and he fidgets with his fingers on her ribcage for a moment before admitting: "Daisy is close enough."

Melinda arches an eyebrow up at him but he's looking too much like the shy nerd with a blush up the tip of his ears that she swore to protect all those years ago not to make it playful. "That's _cheating_."

He chuckles and it ripples against her skin like a flush of bliss, but she concedes the point. He doesn't regret not fathering a child, not like her. He always had it in him.

"The Haig..." He did that too. Just not with her. She hooks her sock clad foot under his calf and he nuzzles at her hairline, his thumb rubbing circles on her shoulder. _Closer_. Closer than clinking her glass to his would have made them maybe.

Her eyes prickle when she reads the eighth line: _Make Melinda smile_. It's crossed off in blue ink, with a little scribbling on the side that's still clear of marks: _Again_.

"It's a daily struggle," he explains. She can feel his soft breath and the little quiver in his smile. "It's getting harder lately."

As if on cue, hot tears track her cheeks and she lets out a shaky breath against his chest. "Phil..."

"I'm afraid I'm all out of dorky lines..."

"I don't want to miss you."

"Then don't," he says nudging her enough to make her look at him. "I'm right here."

 _For how long?_ She can't speak. She closes her eyes and leans in. Because she trusts him with her heart too.

So he kisses her gently, like they have all the time in the world.

* * *

 **The list:**

Complete Cap's card collection

Get married

Have a baby

Drive Lola on Route 66

Read _Ulysses_

Drink that Haig

Make an enemy for life

Make Melinda smile again

See the Earth from space

Let someone else get the chance you missed


End file.
